Believing

This post covers my day on Thursday, but the real purpose of this long post starts after the 4th paragraph.

I'd been meaning to post this for a few days now, but never can quite seem to get to it. Last night, did some work in the office and then got a quick drive-thru lunch from McDonalds prior to sitting down for a few hours of mission support. Quiet day there except for the occasional 7 or so different conversations going on at the same time. I'd missed out on going jogging with J-Dub and Megs the previous day... Mainly cuz i'd forgotten to bring a change for the work clothes. Except for today, I'd been back to wearing button-up shirts and ties. So yeah, a good change in some running or whatever clothes was needed. So after doing some support, packed up, headed over to see Megs and J-Dub. They weren't there, so I was going to head out...they were walking in. Long story short, I went ahead and changed and joined them walking/jogging around the ponds. Had a nice chat with them as we made our circuits. After that, J-Dub went her way, Meg and I made our way to Michaels and just looked at arts and crafts.

Aside from the frames we originally went in there for, we ended up staying a good while just looking at candles, baking stuff, etc, etc. She's great company for this. After that, went off to Barnes and Noble. She was looking for something on her own...I ended up picking up The Odyssey and Who's Who in the Bible (Old Testament, New Testament, and the Apocrypha). I'd gotten the latter for my Grandma since she loves her Bible study and doesn't always get the chance to ask me about some of the who's who in the Bible. So... since I can't answer some of her questions...this book would be a great help. Lots of neat pictures too.

After Barnes, Megs and I had a nice long chat about a good deal of stuff, all during the course of some Starbucks coffee. Oh yeah, it was frickin cold. Made me wonder why I'd picked cold frappuccino...though with peppermint... Oh yeah, I don't do hot coffee.

Anyway, got home, ate dinner around 10-ish, and watched Resident Evil: Apocalypse. I liked this one a bit more than the first one, but it leaves you hanging for the 3rd installment... prolly out in a couple of years. After the movie, I turned to the news, and caught some of Paula Zahn's show on CNN.

They were featuring the current status of the tsunami devastation. They featured a set of parents who just got confirmation that their daughter was dead. They were leaving New York to reclaim her body for burial in NY. They featured a young boy who got swept away by the waves, clung onto a railing, and was now adopted by the owner of the house whose rail he clung onto. His family was lost. They featured a house left standing...the last house still standing.... the only house...still standing. With a few moments to spare, one would imagine, this family raced to a room they felt would be the safest. There, the entire family hid. Parents, two or more children...they hid in one of their rooms. Ironically, their house withstood defiantly the tsunami waves...but the room the family had hidden in...was the only room in the house that collapsed, killing the parents, and washing away the kids.

And as with millions of us, my heart went out to them. I felt for them. I felt the grief they were or couldn't express. And yet I still could not fathom what they were undergoing. I cried for them just as when I woke up on a winter day, talked with one of the guys I trained and worked with... getting an update on a viewing path... having actually woken up really early only to see a little fog potentially blocking my view of the sky... and several minutes later having the sinking feeling when he repeated, "they're not moving". I look in disbelief the wake of this natural disaster. We get them along the Gulf Coast, but never with this much death. Houses can be rebuilt. Business can be restarted. But you only get this life. I watched in disbelief... just as when after racing inside, over a year ago, and seeing something wonderful go wrong. Even before that, I could never imagine people going to work one morning and later dying because it was decided that their place of work was designated a target. Then, we watched the news as planes hit two towers. When a plane hit a government building. Disbelief. It did not sink in until later that night. It did not sink in until later that afternoon. It did not sink in until I saw the news last night. Each time, it took a while to sink in, and when I say sink in, I don't know why, cuz it seems gay (no offense to any who may feel offended, it's just an old habit of a term) but when you just ... well up with a lot of emotion that you just can't control. But when it hits, it just....goes.

I felt as many Americans did when we watched people die, some jumping to their deaths in 2001. I grieved as many of my coworkers when we saw our astronauts in the sky not return. The emotion of this new tragedy hit me last night. Each time, it always follows with a calm of disbelief. Disbelief that it happened. Disbelief that the God that I believe in could let it happen. There had been some who are fucktards and say "Oh, that happened to them cuz they don't believe in God", or even "That happened cuz they're not Christians". That upsets me just as much cuz I want to personally smack the fuckin' bejesus out of them for thinking it. No God would or should let that happen regardless of what you believe, I would think. I mean, sure, I would say in smaller instances, it's a reminder to appreciate what we do have as it can all be easily taken away. But when it's on a massive scale... what fucking reminder IS there? And it's times like these when my personal faith is at its lowest. Not when i am down and losing hope, but when it's affecting a lot more people. I am fearful to question why. I am fearful to begin thinking that the God I believe in doesn't give a shit anymore. And yeah, there are folks out there who'll say, Well, there is no god. And to them, all I can say is... that's nice. That's what you believe in. Now fuck off. My entire point is that I don't have the faith to walk on water. I sometimes lose that faith when times like these are with us. But then as with now, I see us pull together, whether as a group, a nation, or a world, and I start getting faith again. I guess that's what it is, regardless of what we choose to or not to believe in. It's that hope in believing.